Stop Child Abuse Now (SCAN) - 790

Tonight's special guest is Patricia Caldwell Singleton from Arkansas, a returning NAASCA family member. Patricia was a victim of incest from ages 11 to 17 and an adult child of an alcoholic. Her dad and grandfather were mean drunks who influenced her to not drink because she was afraid of becoming like them. When she was 20 Ms. Singleton met her future husband, but made no mention of her incest for the better part of a decade. She writes, "We were married for 8 years when I told him and my sister both about the incest." She continues, "In my marriage, I became a controller thinking that would make me feel safe." Eventually she began working on herself. "I started reading books on self-improvement and started working on letting go of some of my controlling behaviors. Small changes happened but still no work on the incest issues. Today I know that's called denial. Denial keeps you in the hurt." Her real healing started in January 1989 with her first 12-Step meeting in Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACA). She explains, "Those 12-Step meetings and the work I did with my sponsor saved my life and my marriage. I learned about codependency and dysfunctional families. I also went to 12-Step meetings for families and friends of alcoholics (Alanon) and found out where so many of my characteristics came from. I have written about those 12-Step meetings and the healing that I did in my blog Spiritual Journey Of A Lightworker." She's also published two books, "Silent No More" and "Growing Stronger, Growing Free" -- www.thistangledweb.co.uk/online-shop/books/